The main reason I’ve been so busy is a little thing called Imposed Restriction or as most people call it – IR.

IR is where the military member moves to the new location and leaves the family at the old location. My husband moved to Toronto to work at the Canadian Forces College and the kids and I remained here at CFB Trenton.

I know to many civilians this might seem crazy and this isn’t our preferred lifestyle but we did take into account many factors. If your family is considering IR, read on and see how we made our decision.

The Job

My husband’s job entails a fairly busy weekday schedule and nothing much to do on the weekends. This would allow him to come home almost every weekend.

Living Away From Home

My husband chose to live on rations and quarters. This means he has a room, similar to a hotel suite with a small fridge, coffee maker, microwave, toaster and kettle. He can eat 3 meals per day in the Officers’ Mess. Simple and easy for him.

Commute to Home

On the train, it takes 1h50 to travel from Trenton to Toronto. The cost is less than $100 per trip. The cost of the train home every weekend is less than owning a second car. Taking the train is also significantly less stressful than driving.

Children

With one kid almost done secondary school and the other almost ready to start secondary school, it wasn’t the best time for them to change schools. Also, the school here in Trenton has less than 300 kids from Jr. Kindergarten to Grade 12 – it is almost like private school! The kids know all the teachers and the teachers know all the kids. The big bonus is that our kids walk about 200 meters to school.

In Toronto, the schools are very large and the kids would not receive the one-on-one that they receive here. In Toronto, they would very likely have to take a school bus every day through Toronto traffic.

The children also have extracurricular activities they enjoy here in Trenton – ones that we could not find (or afford) in Toronto.

My Work

After being here for over 2 years, my business is doing really well. I would have to start again from scratch in Toronto. Something that I would not be interested in doing.

Disadvantages

It has been hard these last few months being a single parent all week. Between work, school and activities, sometimes I feel like I’m never home (actually I’m often NOT home which is why I have had such a hard time posting on this blog!) Also, I know the kids miss Daddy and vise versa.

Overall things are working out well but if the commute were any longer, we would have moved.

Have you done IR? How did it work out? What was your decision making process?

Even though the program was essentially the same as it was 2 years ago, for me the event was quite different as this time we were saying good-bye to co-workers and friends we had made.

Although we’re sad to be leaving the unit here, we’re starting a new chapter in our lives that will I’m sure be full of happy surprises.

We’ll never forget our friends and experiences with CFLAWC and we wish them all the best as they go ALL THE WAY!

We successfully moved into the new house. It took about 2 weeks to get things in order. As I was still teaching at the local community college it took a little longer than usual. The basement still isn’t set up the way I want it but…

About the time the house was almost in order, I took on a full-time corporate client and I’m working there until the end of July.

Unfortunately my husband is on holidays for the month of July and starts work in August just as I’m finishing.

The kids are going to be enjoying some local day camps (golf, equestrian and sailing) over the summer.

Hopefully things will slow down soon.

Army is crazy! I love it!

All the curtains (except the bedrooms) are down, washed and packed in a Rubbermaid bin. I pre-pack curtains in a labeled bin so that I can find them easily at destination. (We actually have 3 bins of curtains). If these curtains don’t fit any of the windows in the new house, I can just leave them in the bins and I know that they are already cleaned.

All the pictures are off the walls and piled in a corner of the living room. It is much easier for the packers to have all of the framed pictures in one place. They don’t have to drag the special boxes all over the house and the fragile items can stay out of the way of everything else.

The weird closet at the top of the stairs has been emptied. Normally I let the packers empty the closets but this bizarre closet is located at the top of the stairs and you have to open the door pull something out, close the door then put it in a box. Very time consuming and dangerous as there is a risk of falling over the railing and down the stairs.

The shower curtains have been taken down and washed. All the towels have been washed. All the bedsheets, mattress covers and blankets have been washed. There is one  more load of clothes to wash – what we were wearing today. The appliance guy comes tomorrow to disconnect and block the washer.

All the garbage pails in the house (except the kitchen) have been emptied. Goodness knows I don’t want garbage packed on the truck. All of the recycling has been gathered and placed OUTSIDE in the recycling bin. The kitchen garbage will go out tomorrow after breakfast.

The kids have their clothes packed in suitcases. When they get up tomorrow, they’ll add their pyjamas and toothbrushes then the suitcases will go in the car.

As for me, I’ve got to pack my own suitcase, wash the dishes and finish that last load of laundry – and here I am updating this blog!!!

Back to work for me! It will be a long day tomorrow!

I had my riding lesson and purchased a minimal amount of groceries, just to get us through until Monday.

The moving company sent their representative to do the estimate. She toured the house and prepared a list of how many boxes would be required to do the move. She also informed me of the list of items that the moving company will not pack. These items include:

• liquids
• corrosives
• batteries
• explosives
• flammables
• alcohols
• compressed gases
• live houseplants

We have 3 glass jars of salsa, 2 bottles of wine, a can of WD-40, liquid laundry detergent, shampoo etc. that we’ll have to transport ourselves. If we had more warning about this move, or if it had been a longer distance, I would have made more effort to get reduce the amount of these items. However, we are lucky we can make several trips with our own car.

Now we return to our regularly scheduled program of laundry and dinner preparations.

We purchased a new shed (the new house does not have a garage) and lumber to build a platform for the shed. I’m SO glad my hubby is on holidays this week.

A few large items of furniture were taken to charity.

Lots of laundry was processed and we started to wash all non-essential curtains and removed those curtain rods.

I also answered client inquiries and prepared for the college course I’m teaching.

Kid #2 went to her riding lesson in the evening.

The moving company estimation is done tomorrow!

The kids put all their toys in their bedrooms. Our new house doesn’t have a “family room” but the bedrooms are bigger so the kids can play in their bedrooms. If we want stuff to be unpacked in a certain area, it needs to be packed in a certain area. We also did a tour of the house and “put stuff back” meaning we put stuff where we want it unpacked in our new house.

I changed our address with the car and house insurance company. I keep it simple by only having one insurance provider. We also get a bit of a discount on premiums.

The provincial government (Ontario) has a quick and easy online address change service for all provincial government offices (health cards, vehicle license & registration and drivers’ license). It only works if you’re moving within the province and it is really easy! It took me about 5 minutes to change all of my information as well as the children’s health cards.

I also did numerous address changes with our loyalty programs (Airmiles, store programs) and some of our magazine subscriptions. It is quick and easy when it is online. I’ve saved the websites to my bookmarks and the subscription numbers and login and usernames to a spreadsheet on my computer. I’ll be ready for the next time!

We also started changing all the CFL bulbs back to the incandescent light bulbs that were in the fixtures when we arrived. The first time we moved after CFL bulbs were introduced, I waited until the last minute to change the light bulbs back but the moves had packed all of the incandescent light bulbs. CFL bulbs are expensive and I want to take them with me. This also allows me time to clean all the light fixtures – something that must be done before the “march out” procedure.

Curious as to what a “march out” is? When you move into a military home, you “march in” through the house with a Base housing inspector and note any problems with the house. Before you vacate the house you must “march out” with a Base housing inspector to ensure that the house is as good as when you moved in. Normal wear and tear is expected but you still have to clean the crayons off the walls!

• We slept in late because of the switch to Daylight Saving Time. I ate 4 chocolate covered coffee beans to wake up but it didn’t help much.
• We went to visit family  – to wish my Mom a happy birthday and give my niece some hand-me-down toys and books. That stuff is out of our house now and won’t get lost in the shuffle of the move. We also gave my parents a half bottle of rye whiskey that neither my husband nor I enjoy and the movers won’t take anyway.
• We made dinner by using up more food from the freezer. The freezer must be empty and dry before it goes on the truck.
• We made a list of jobs that each person can do tomorrow.

You may have noticed that I haven’t started putting things in boxes yet. That’s because this move (typical military) is a “full service” move. That means they pack everything. You might think that is a good thing but there are disadvantages.

Disadvantages of a full service move:

Things are packed wherever they are. If you have a dirty cereal bowl in the living room when the packers arrive, expect that cereal bowl to be unpacked in the living room of your new house, complete with old cereal petrified to the bowl.

Everything is packed in one day. If you’ve got a lot of stuff it is a VERY long day. If you’ve got lots and lots of stuff, then you may be entitled to a “pre-pack” day. During a “pre-pack” the movers pack up all the stuff you aren’t using on a regular basis. You may think this is a good thing but the packers have their own idea about what “regular basis” actually means. You must watch them at all times (and sometimes that means being in 2 places at once). The last time we had a “pre-pack” they packed ALL extra rolls of toilet paper!

You have people in your house, not treating your stuff as if it was theirs. Enough said!

Do you have any disadvantages to add?

The old house has a garage and the new house does not. We searched the online classified ads and found one in the local area. We went to see it but the seller said he can’t sell it until 2 weeks AFTER we need it. We will probably have to buy and build our own shed.

I printed up business cards with our new address. It is much easier to hand someone the card with the correct spelling of the street and correct postal code. Over the next two weeks I’ll be dropping them off at the doctor’s office, dental clinics, orthodontist, etc.

I scrubbed out the dishwasher. Every few months — and definitely before a move — it is beneficial to take an old toothbrush and clean the crud from around the door of the dishwasher and around the little nooks and crannies. When finished, I dumped a litre of vinegar in the bottom of the dishwasher and ran a rinse only cycle. If this was a long-distance move and the dishwasher would be on the truck for a few days, I’d do this procedure a day or so before loading the dishwasher on the truck. I would let the inside of the dishwasher dry out then dump some baking soda in the bottom. On arrival at the new house, I’d run a quick rinse cycle to clean out the baking soda and freshen the dishwasher.

The children sorted through all their toys, books and clothes. We piled all of the stuff that no longer fits or is needed. All of the clothes and toys are in a pile in one corner of the basement to be donated. We dropped the books off for donation at the local library this morning.

The children “binned” all the toys they are keeping. Because we move so often, each group of toys has its own labelled Rubbermaid bin. All of the dolls, their clothes, accessories and furniture, get put in one bin. This makes it easy to find all the doll stuff as soon as we move in to the new house. The Lego has its own bin too!

I picked up a few groceries too but only the absolute essentials. We’ve got to have the fridge and freezer empty before they go on the truck. This evening I’ll be planning meals for the next few days in order to use up all the food we’ve got. If I’d have known we were moving I wouldn’t have purchased the 2 dozen cans of frozen orange juice that were on sale last week!

I processed the normal weekend laundry. I want to get all the clothes done today. Later this week there will be lots more to wash — sheets, blankets, towels and curtains!

The one thing I don’t do when we’re preparing to move is clean the house. I clean stuff in the house (appliances and furniture) but I don’t dust baseboards or clean windows. It is so much easier to do all of that when the house is empty!

* update Facebook status in a panic
* fire off Twitter messages in a panic
* send panicky emails to various family members
* freak out on the phone to your parents, husband, friends
* recount a bazillion reasons why this will be impossible to do
* eat 2 boxes of chocolate

And how does any of this help organize a move you ask?

Getting the panic over with early in the game allows you to focus on everything that needs to get done.
My biggest tip:

Get a good sleep because the real work starts tomorrow!